Blind Date  One Shot Song Fic
by montee916
Summary: My AU version of how Luke and Mara finally got their act together.


**A/N: I thought I'd post some of my older stuff that I used to write when I was in a Star Wars kind of mood. :-) This story is the first one I wrote and is still my favourite for some reason. The story was written around the lyrics of "All The Love In The World" by The Coors, and they are the portions that are in bold and underlined. In the timeline this piece would fit in around "Vision Of The Future" but apart from a couple of scenes, those books never took place in this. Hope you enjoy it.**

I sighed as I consulted my chrono for the fifth time since I had arrived. No doubt about it, Kardde was going to get a piece of my mind when _if! _he did show up. After all the talking he had done about it being so important for me to get back to Coruscant to meet him here, and he couldn't even have the decency to be on time. _Make that a very BIG piece._

I had no doubts his comm being switched off was just to annoy me personally. I finished off my caf and contemplated ordering a third cup while I waited. _It's for kriffing sure he can pick up the tab for this little dinner of his. Serves him right if I run it up, too - he's already twenty minutes late. Anyone would think I had nothing better to do than wait for him all night! _It was bad enough he'd asked me to meet him here, in one of the finest restaurants Coruscant had to offer. Then he had the temerity to have a package delivered to me with an outfit that he expected me to wear. I had been tempted to use it to clean the alluvial dampeners on the _Fire _before wearing it to dinner, but after seeing it, even I had to admit he'd made a good choice.

Not that I'd ever admit it to him.

If it hadn't been for the fact that I know him so well, and he knows me, I would have been given to wonder what it was he was really after. He had provided me with a long flowing dress which left my shoulders exposed, shoes with heels two inches high and a shawl to wrap around me to keep warm. _And which should be perfect to hang him with when this is over. _I gazed dreamily out at the cityscape around me. _At least he got a table on the balcony. It'll make it easier - I can tie the other end to the railing and just toss him over the edge, make sure I do the job properly._

**I'm not looking for someone to talk to I've got my friends, I'm more than ok**

**I've got more than a girl could wish for I live my dreams but it's not all they say**

_This was so much easier when I was working for myself. At least if I'd stayed on my ship instead of meeting him here, I would have had Faughn and the others for company while I wait! _I smiled to myself as I thought back to Faughn's comments on the run we had made, a month ago now, getting Luke out of the Cavrilhu pirate base. _We DO make a pretty good team when we get together. _A small shiver ran up my neck that had nothing to do with the weather as I recalled the look in his eyes when he had snapped out of his trance just in time to prevent us from decorating the bulkhead.

**Still I believe I'm missing something real**

**I need someone who really sees me**

_Have they always been that colour? How could I not have noticed before now… _Even though I was irked at his protectiveness _his smothering! _on the flight out, I couldn't find it in me to stay mad at him. He was pretty much at the top of a very short list of people I could actually consider friends. _From the first day I met him, I had told him I wanted him dead. Yet it was never enough to push him away. If anything, it drew him closer, like he knew even before I did that it wasn't what I really wanted. That it wasn't who I really was._ Losing myself in my thoughts, I didn't even notice the familiar presence approaching from behind me, until a jolt of pure joy burst forth and a voice that I had often heard in my dreams sounded in my ears.

"Hello, Mara."

**Don't wanna wake up alone anymore**

**Still believing you'll walk through my door**

"Skywalker? _Speak of the Sith… _What are you doing… here…"

My voice trailed off as I turned to face him and saw him standing in the doorway leading out to the balcony. For so long I had known him, had seen him in so many forms. The hotshot pilot. The serene Jedi Master. The battle hardened warrior. The devoted uncle. Yet somehow I could never recall seeing the Luke that was before me now. The Luke that was standing there in a suit the same impossible shade of blue as his eyes, a small bouquet of flowers in his hands, and a shy smile on his face that made my breath catch in my throat. This was certainly a Luke I hadn't seen before.

But it was a Luke I could certainly get used to seeing.

**All I need is to know it's for sure**

**Then I'll give all the love in the world**

He approached slowly. "I'm sorry for keeping you waiting like this. I would have been here sooner, but the florist had all manner of problems tracking these down for me. I believe they're a favourite of yours?" He handed me the flowers and stood there with his hands clasped behind his back as I took them.

"Alderannian star-furies?" I was aghast. "Luke, these are…" _are what? _My mind spun. _Impossible to find? Insanely expensive? _"…they're beautiful." I whispered, finally.

"Then they're in good company." Luke smiled at the expression on my face. For years I had been catching him off guard with things I would say or do that he hadn't been expecting; I guess he had decided now was as good a time as any to return the favour. He waved a hand to the empty chair. "May I?"

"What…? Yes, of course, please, sit." _Get it together, Jade! _My mind raged as he took a seat and placed a napkin on his lap, browsing over the menu in front of him. His mouth twitched upward slightly in a smile - he didn't even need to look at me to know that my eyes were boring a hole in him as I tried to figure out what was happening.

"Do you have any recommendations?" He asked casually, folding his fingers together and placing his chin on his hands as he returned my gaze across the table. "I've heard a lot of good things about this place, but I haven't actually eaten here before."

"No, it's my first time too." I blurted out, and a flush rose as I caught the mischievous twinkle my comment sparked in Luke's eyes. "I mean, I haven't been here before either." Now he was smiling, too, but I couldn't deny a small thrill at being the one to put the smile there in the first place. _Oh, of all the… since when do I get stuck for words around Luke? Or wish Luke would smile at me the way he is now, but a lot more often? _I stifled the urge to groan and slap my hand against my forehead. _And since when did he become Luke instead of Skywalker? _I decided I would need to get the advantage over him back, before I did something really stupid, like saying out loud some of the things that were running through my head.

"So… how did you know…"

"You'd be here?" He pursed his lips slightly as he poured a glass of water for himself and took a large gulp. "I have something of a confession to make on that count. I called in a marker that Talon owed me, and got him to help organise this… meeting."

"Organise… Talon _Kardde_?"

"Yes."

"Helped you organise this."

"Yes."

"A blind date."

"Yes."

"He set me up for you."

Luke smirked in a manner that I knew he could have only picked up from having had too many adventures with Solo."Yes." He leaned back and took a second gulp from his glass, as he watched the colour rising in my cheeks.

_I'm gonna hang the kriffing pair of them! No, wait, I'm still a professional. That'd be too quick… _I snatched up the fork from the table and pointed it at Luke threateningly. "Have you lost your mind, or did you just forget what I used to do for a living? I can think of at least eighteen different places I can put this fork where you wouldn't want it, and that's without even trying! You best have a REAL good explanation for this, or you're going to be able to name every one of them."

"Well, _I _thought it was a good reason, but _you_ may want to eat first in case it spoils your appetite."

"Cut the bantha fodder, Skywalker. Answer the question."

Luke sighed. "Mara, I really think it would be best if you just…"

"The only thing you need to think about is where I'm going to stick this first." My eyes narrowed threateningly and I saw the waiter approaching to take our orders. "You have until he gets here to tell me in as few words as possible what this is all about, or I'm going to forget what a nice person I am and finish what I started on Myrkr."

He stiffened in his chair and swallowed hard. "That's fine, I only need three words."

"And what three words are you planning on using?" Alarms bells started ringing in my mind as I said it out loud. _He can't mean… No. No way. Not a chance. Not in all seven Corellian hells. He can't mean THOSE three words._

_…can he?_

"I love you."

**I've often wondered if love's an illusion Just to get you through the loneliest days**

**I can't criticize it - I have no hesitation My imagination just stole me away**

_Luke… You… He… Oh shavitz. Sithspit, Skywalker, you've really stepped in it this time. Of all the things you could have said, it had to be __**that**__. So many times I feared I'd never have anyone say that to me. So many times I hoped for the same thing. Now, to hear it from you of all people… LUKE loves me. Who? Luke LOVES me. How? Luke loves ME. Why?_

The waiter arrived at our table with a stylus in one hand and a flimsy in the other, and his eyes widened as he recognised who Luke was. "Master Skywalker." he breathed. "Sir, welcome to the _Andur's Dream_. It's an honour to have you here. If there is anything you require, don't hesitate to ask."

"Thank you, I appreciate the consideration." Luke smiled tiredly. "More than anything, we really need some privacy, as we have some important matters to discuss."

"I quite understand, sir." The waiter replied, in a tone of voice so similar to Leia's protocol droid that it made me wonder if he didn't get his personality from the same assembly line. "I'll speak to the management and see to it personally. In the mean time, would you and your partner care to order?"

"Yes, I'll have the tellurian fish in cenera sauce, and a gorbara salad."

"_Excellent _choice, sir. And for the lady?" He turned to me, but I couldn't even manage a response. I just sat there looking at Luke as if shell-shocked. Luke squirmed in his chair before speaking.

"You'll have to excuse my friend, she's… meditating. Just make mine for two. And a bottle of whatever the house recommends."

"Very good, sir." The waiter tucked away the order and headed back the way he had come, leaving the two of us alone in the still night air, and Luke turned his full attention to me.

"Mara, are you alright? I know it's a shock, but…"

"Luke, you need to think very carefully about what you're saying. You, of all people, need to be careful of weaknesses that can be exploited. Giving your heart away like this can lead to the greatest weaknesses of all." _I should know. _I thought bitterly. _As Palpatine's Hand, I was taught all too well how to use that kind of weakness._

"It can also be the source of the greatest strength a person can ever know." Luke observed softly. "When I was caught in that pirate base, I thought for sure my luck had finally run out, that I was going to die there. Do you know what my biggest regret was? It wasn't that I'd been captured, or that my plan wasn't as clever as I'd thought, or even that they would escape and continue raiding traders vessels, which would mean I'd failed. It was that I wouldn't get another chance to see you again, hear you laugh, make you smile." He looked down at his hands in front of him. "I would have even enjoyed one last argument, with the way you get that fire in your eyes. Then out of nowhere you arrived, and we were so busy getting out of there I never had the chance to ask myself _why _I regretted it so much_._ Not until after you were gone again."

**Still I believe I'm missing something real**

**I need someone who really sees me**

"Luke… You know my history. The things I've done." _The parts I've been able to tell you about, at least. _"They're things that can't be changed, no matter how much you try. People are going to talk."

"I wouldn't want them to change. That would mean changing who you are, who you've become, and that's something I'd never want." He replied firmly. "As for the talk, that's all it would ever be. They've been talking about me for years anyway, so to the Maw with the lot of them. Or even better," He said with a playful smile, "Let's give them something to talk about."

**Don't wanna wake up alone anymore Still believing you'll walk through my door**

**All I need is to know it's for sure Then I'll give all the love in the world**

I had to admit, there were times when I would daydream about the idea of the two of us being together. Never too seriously, of course. I had no reason to think Luke ever felt that way, not about me. But here, now, he was saying that he did feel more than I had ever realised he could, and I in response could only give him the same level of honesty in return. The same honesty I owed myself. I looked across the table into his eyes, his soul, and I knew the truth.

_If I could ask the Force for only one thing, only one person, it would be you._

**Love's for a lifetime not for a moment So how could I throw it away**

A cynical laugh sounded in the back of my mind, some long hidden fragment of Palpatine's training perhaps.

_You value your freedom too highly. You know what his idea of commitment would mean. How can you think you would be strong enough to live under his constraints for the rest of your life?_

I answered with Luke's own words.

_It can be the source of the greatest strength a person can ever know. Allowing him to love me, and to love him in return, that isn't a constraint. That's the greatest freedom I could ever give myself._

**Yeah I'm only human And nights grow colder**

**With no-one to love me that way**

_Besides, it isn't a question of being strong enough to live with him. How could I ever be strong enough to go on living without him, or what he has offered? Haven't I lived that life for too long already as it is?_

The laughter stopped so suddenly I gasped.

**Yeah I need someone who really sees me**

Luke frowned slightly, a hint of worry in his expression. "Look, Mara, I know this is a lot to throw at you, and I certainly don't expect you to have an answer for me right now. You need time to consider it, obviously. But…" He took a deep breath. "Whatever decision you make, I'll respect it. It is your decision to make, after all. But can I just ask you to promise me you'll think about it? Take all the time you need, talk to whoever you feel you need to talk to about it, but…

"No."

**And I won't wake up alone anymore Still believing you'll walk through my door**

"I can't promise you that, because there's nothing to think about. My decision is made." I swallowed hard at what I was about to say, but I couldn't deny it - I knew it was right. I placed my hand on the table between us.

"I don't know where this road will take us, or what lies ahead, but one thing I do know - there's no one else I'd want to travel it with. Because I love you too."

**You'll reach for me and I'll know it's for sure**

His face, his entire body, seemed to glow with the joy he felt at my answer, and he sniffled a couple of times as he took my hand in both of his, which trembled as he did so.

"Then before you travel that road, hang on for a minute," he said with a smile. "I'll come with you."

**Then I'll give all the love in the world**


End file.
